Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Any of various chiefly deciduous trees or shrubs of the genus Acer of the Northern Hemisphere, having opposite, usually palmate leaves and fruits consisting of paired seeds attached to long wings.
  • noun The wood of any of these trees, especially the hard, close-grained wood of the sugar maple, often used for furniture and flooring.
  • noun The flavor of the concentrated sap of the sugar maple.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun See mapple.
  • noun A tree of the genus Acer, natural order Sapindaceœ, peculiar to the northern temperate parts of the globe.
  • noun The wood of this tree.
  • Consisting or made of, or derived from, maple or the maple-tree.
  • noun In New Zealand, a common settlers' corruption of mapau.
  • noun In Australia, Chariessa Moorei, the scrub silky oak (which see, under oak).
  • noun The sugar-maple.
  • noun The box-elder, Acer Negundo.
  • noun The box-elder.
  • noun The mountain-maple.
  • noun The silver maple.
  • noun The mountain-maple.
  • noun The red maple: so called from its white wood. Compare shoe-peg maple.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Bot.) A tree of the genus Acer, including about fifty species. Acer saccharinum is the rock maple, or sugar maple, from the sap of which sugar is made, in the United States, in great quantities, by evaporation; the red maple or swamp maple is Acer rubrum; the silver maple, Acer dasycarpum, having fruit wooly when young; the striped maple, Acer Pennsylvanium, called also moosewood. The common maple of Europe is Acer campestre, the sycamore maple is Acer Pseudo-platanus, and the Norway maple is Acer platanoides.
  • noun varieties of the wood of the rock maple, in which a beautiful lustrous grain is produced by the sinuous course of the fibers.
  • noun maple sap boiled to the consistency of molasses.
  • noun sugar obtained from the sap of the sugar maple by evaporation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A tree of the Acer genus, characterised by its usually palmate leaves and winged seeds.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun wood of any of various maple trees; especially the hard close-grained wood of the sugar maple; used especially for furniture and flooring
  • noun any of numerous trees or shrubs of the genus Acer bearing winged seeds in pairs; north temperate zone

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English mapul- (as in mapultrēo, maple tree).]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Old English mapultrēow, from Proto-Germanic *mapulaz (compare Old Icelandic möpurr, Middle Low German mapeldorn, German Masseller, Maßholder), perhaps a blend of *masuraz 'knob; maple-tree' (compare Old Icelandic mösurr 'maple', Low German/German Maser 'knob, offshoot') and *apulaz 'apple' (see apple), from *masam 'lump, knob' (compare obsolete German Mase 'scar', modern Maser 'speck, measle'). More at measles.

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Examples

  • Comparisons: The Norway maple is apt to be confused with the _sycamore maple_ (_Acer pseudoplatanus_), but differs from the latter in having a reddish bud instead of a green bud, and a close bark instead of a scaly bark.

    Studies of Trees Jacob Joshua Levison

  • Other common names: The red maple is sometimes known as _swamp maple_.

    Studies of Trees Jacob Joshua Levison

  • Other common names: The sugar maple is sometimes called _rock maple_ or

    Studies of Trees Jacob Joshua Levison

  • Other common names: The silver maple is sometimes known as _soft maple_ or _white maple_.

    Studies of Trees Jacob Joshua Levison

  • _Rocky Sugar, Hard maple, Sugar tree_ 144-146 saccharinum, var. nigrum, T. and G. _Black maple_ 146, 147

    Handbook of the Trees of New England Lorin Low Dame 1860

  • _sugar maple borer_ and the _maple phenacoccus_, a sucking insect.

    Studies of Trees Jacob Joshua Levison

  • The Manitoba maple is a very shallow-rooted maple, so if it grows to full height a good stiff wind can blow it over; as a result, if you find one growing in your hard, you want to yank it before it gets too big!

    flags 2005

  • Not only because I am from Canada and the maple is our national emblem, but also because maple trees are to be found in every country that had POWs on Taiwan – including Taiwan itself!

    Never Forgotten Newsletter 2002

  • Quebec forbids the use of the word "maple," or of maple-leaf shapes or pictures, on any bottle that does not contain 100-per-cent pure maple syrup.

    The Globe and Mail - Home RSS feed 2011

  • Syrup should be the consistency of thin maple syrup (it will thicken a bit more once it has cooled).

    Rum-Poached Pears | Baking Bites 2009

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